The blogosphere's power and net neutrality.
I've been silent for a couple of weeks, dealing with departmental politics and learning to read Norwegian newspapers. More on these shortly, perhaps. But at the same time I've been paying casual attention to the debate about net neutrality in the blogosphere.
Net neutrality is exactly the kind of issue that the blogosphere is best suited for. It is a natural test of the capacities of the blogosphere for deliberation and policy influence. It might be fun to do a formal study of it. Is anyone working on that?
Here's my take. It's an issue that suits the experiences and enthusiasms of bloggers. We all know something about the vagaries of internet access, and most of us have enough history with the web to remember its less stratified days and be able to project a far more stratified future. Furthermore, most bloggers, or at least most political bloggers, have an instinct about the web as a public space. So just in terms of motivation and personal interest, the concept of net neutrality means a lot to most of us before we even bother to learn what exactly it means.
But it's also the kind of issue where the expert knowledges that circulate in the blogosphere readily come into play. It's similar to Rathergate, where suddenly you heard from a lot of people who knew a lot about the IBM Selectric typewriter. This allows the complexities of the issue to overtake initial sloganeering.
Bloggers have taken sides, but not strictly along party lines--another of the signal features of blogosphere discourse at its best. Some lefties maintained their neutrality, and some righties showed great suspicion of the corporate interests at play. The issue touches a bedrock libertarianism and egalitarianism that the space and technology of blogging cultivate.
But as the debate has progressed, the left-right lines have reformed, I think. Lefties who were once agnostic are now persuaded, for instance. And the lobbying machinery of the net has swung into action.
As the blogosphere's discussion has turned from deliberation to mobilization, has its influence changed? About this I'm not sure. Perhaps its influence was always going to be, in the final analysis, just another form of lobbying. This would indicate that it's not a truly new public space, and that it has influence only when it works through the old channels of phone calls to Congressional reps, or cups of coffee with staffers.
Thinking this through over the next few days....
I've been silent for a couple of weeks, dealing with departmental politics and learning to read Norwegian newspapers. More on these shortly, perhaps. But at the same time I've been paying casual attention to the debate about net neutrality in the blogosphere.
Net neutrality is exactly the kind of issue that the blogosphere is best suited for. It is a natural test of the capacities of the blogosphere for deliberation and policy influence. It might be fun to do a formal study of it. Is anyone working on that?
Here's my take. It's an issue that suits the experiences and enthusiasms of bloggers. We all know something about the vagaries of internet access, and most of us have enough history with the web to remember its less stratified days and be able to project a far more stratified future. Furthermore, most bloggers, or at least most political bloggers, have an instinct about the web as a public space. So just in terms of motivation and personal interest, the concept of net neutrality means a lot to most of us before we even bother to learn what exactly it means.
But it's also the kind of issue where the expert knowledges that circulate in the blogosphere readily come into play. It's similar to Rathergate, where suddenly you heard from a lot of people who knew a lot about the IBM Selectric typewriter. This allows the complexities of the issue to overtake initial sloganeering.
Bloggers have taken sides, but not strictly along party lines--another of the signal features of blogosphere discourse at its best. Some lefties maintained their neutrality, and some righties showed great suspicion of the corporate interests at play. The issue touches a bedrock libertarianism and egalitarianism that the space and technology of blogging cultivate.
But as the debate has progressed, the left-right lines have reformed, I think. Lefties who were once agnostic are now persuaded, for instance. And the lobbying machinery of the net has swung into action.
As the blogosphere's discussion has turned from deliberation to mobilization, has its influence changed? About this I'm not sure. Perhaps its influence was always going to be, in the final analysis, just another form of lobbying. This would indicate that it's not a truly new public space, and that it has influence only when it works through the old channels of phone calls to Congressional reps, or cups of coffee with staffers.
Thinking this through over the next few days....
posted by jnerone at 1:36 AM
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